Is Valve Banning Innocent Steam User Accounts?

159 comments to "Is Valve Banning Innocent Steam User Accounts?"

1. MissingFrame says:

   Too bad when claiming something is “perfect” it only takes a single flaw to disprove that claim. So much for the “no false positives”

   November 7th, 2005 at 4:45 pm

2. Kent says:

   Seems to me, that if someone went out and bought a second copy of the game when he was banned from his first account, then they *can* get away with it.

   Seems more like the customers need to realize how much disdain that Valve has for them, and perhaps look for a better game company to support with their dollars.

   November 7th, 2005 at 4:50 pm

3. David Johnston says:

   I wonder if this action is even *legal*. My brother didn’t violate the EULA yet they removed functionality from his game.

   November 7th, 2005 at 5:31 pm

4. Alice says:

   It has to be illegal.

   November 7th, 2005 at 6:05 pm

5. Lockergnome's Tech News Watch says:

   Is Valve Banning Innocent Steam User Accounts?

   David Johnston of RealTechNews writes: Hint: the answer is yes. My brother’s Steam account, which he uses to play Counter-Strike and Counter-Strike: Source was permanently banned by Valve’s anti-cheating program, VAC, on either Friday or Saturday of …

   November 7th, 2005 at 6:50 pm

6. Inglix the Mad says:

   Only an idiot claims something is beyond reproach. They set themselves up to fall right there. As for the Steam Forum monkeys: I tried to reason with them once about introducing weapon sway, boy did that draw a raw response.

   Your brother probably didn’t even accidentally click on a “JAPS” server, whatever the heck that is, just Valve won’t admit their software isn’t foolproof. The irony is that this shows Valve to be fools.

   Just another company, like SOE with their recent Star Wars Galaxies change, that will never get another penny from me. Seems like SOE and Valve both attended the same “screw your current customer, there’s always more” school of economics.

   November 7th, 2005 at 10:13 pm

7. Douglas M says:

   Well I should make a note that neither of them were banned for VAC or cheating. After a steam update their accounts simply say disabled after they get a strange error message the first time they attempt to join a server after the update.

   So therefore they cannot use the product at all, not even single player for a product they legally purchased, with reciepts, and Steam still doesnt give a damn.

   November 7th, 2005 at 11:54 pm

8. Douglas M says:

   Well I should comment on my previous post. Neither of my 2 friends were banned by VAC. After a steam update they went into a server, got a strange error and then their account is disabled and no error is given.

   Therefore, they cannot play any of their legally bought games, with receipts, either single player or not.

   November 7th, 2005 at 11:56 pm

9. nitro says:

   I had my account banned because I had canceled my credit card used to originally purchase the game. My wallet had been stolen and so I cancelled all my credit cards. Apparently, they chedked the status of my card (without authorization)at some point to verify a true copy (or whatever). It took many frustrating emails with valve and their craptastic support (helllooo! NO phone support??), finally they reactivated my account after I explained to them that they were essentially stealing my money. Forget about valve, play a real game like Battlefield 2 and suck the EA cock for a while. Pffft… the state of gaming is sad indeed.

   November 7th, 2005 at 11:57 pm

10. thewebguy says:

    man this sucks, if valve can’t deliver an actually foolproof anticheat, cs players are in for a world of hurt.

    November 8th, 2005 at 12:02 am

11. jeremy says:

    You know, they do have exploits, such as SiX-Steam and others that WILL get your passwords and steal your account, and do cheat on it.

    Now, Valve should give you a copy of the log from the server you were banned in.

    Anywho, go buy it again, and

    November 8th, 2005 at 12:10 am

12. djdev says:

    yea.. the same thing happend to me I ended up buying a new copy half life.
    after i put in the new cdkey, it turned out both my old cdkey and the new one worked…i dont cheat, i just play cs on sundays when i’m drunk i’m not really good but yea it sucked cuz i enjoy cs alot. i hope they change it or make their system better.

    November 8th, 2005 at 12:14 am

13. Douglas M says:

    Here is what I can tell you. Most of this is happening just after a Steam update. It has alreay happened to 3 of my friends accounts. One was lucky and the account was unbanned 2 days afterwards.

    It is happening to people who are not using any mods or hacks or anything of that nature.

    First friend it happened to Memorial Day weekend this year, second was mid August and the last one happened about 3 weeks ago.

    Furthermore the first friend that had their account banned for no reason tried to contact steam for 3 MONTHS with zero reply. He gave them proof of purchase and everything in multiple emails, even tried to find a way to call them and they simply ignored him.

    Everytime I use my steam account I fear I will be next.

    Steam is treating everyone this happens to as if they are guilty and the consumers can do nothing about it. Im glad someone somewhere is finally speaking out and maybe my friends can get back what they rightfully paid their hard earned money for.

    Class Action anyone?

    November 8th, 2005 at 12:41 am

14. Jorgie says:

    The reason they say there are no false positives is because they gather data over WEEKS and it is reviewed by humans.

    VAC does not ban you Valve does; VAC just gathers the data.

    November 8th, 2005 at 12:45 am

15. djdev says:

    mine happend right after i updated steam my account it was banned after i bought the new copy it was unbanned by then.

    November 8th, 2005 at 1:21 am

16. David says:

    Good grief man, that forum is one of the worst I’ve ever seen. Stuck up, high and mighty idiots. You gave them a good reason that I think is legitamate and info about yourself to tell them you’re not some n00b and they treat you like crap. That sucks, but I’m glad it got resolved. Personally, if I had seen that the VAC is 100% foolproof I would have just laughed. Nothing is 100% foolproof.

    Sounds like Valve needs to get their act together before someone gets really pissed. There’s NO excuse for mistreating your customers, and so many companies do it. It’s really pathetic.

    November 8th, 2005 at 4:33 am

17. David says:

    Heh, I’m glad to see an admin came along and told the idiots that they were, in fact, idiots. Funny how fast they changed their tunes after that. “I wasn’t talking about game servers, I was talking about VAC servers”

    Suuuure you were.

    November 8th, 2005 at 4:39 am

18. Killah2km says:

    I barely play hl2 online, but if I was to one day go online and see my account banned for no reason, there would be no support from me for future valve products, I bought halflife 2 because I think it was worth the money. If they think they can cheat me think again, I would just go and get all their future goodies for free. Valve needs to realise that people are not gonna stick around and put up with their bull. There are other options people, if valve wants to cheat us we can cheat them back >:)

    November 8th, 2005 at 4:42 am

19. ThePhaige says:

    I had my account disabled also for trying to buy HL2 silver on my sons account. They said it was CC fraud prevention. Well When I purchased the game he played it for like 3 weeks before they disabled it and had my money in there account. I had to send a pic of a Valid drivers liscence and apic of the CC (last 4 digits showing only).
    It took 2 weeks. I still cannot use a CC to buy games If it is a card that has been used before. I am also aware of accounts being banned outta the blue for hack violations and then reinstated a few days later. I dont understand where the shame in admitting a flaw. Just be honest and tell your customers you are working on it. a simple stament like:

    Dear valued customers as you know Steam is a never been tried before system for admistering games and offering a more secure hack free environment, Being that the technology is new there may be bugs and anomolies that we may need to work out along the way, If you do fall victim to one of these anomilies please understand we will give it our utmost attention and resolve the issue ASAP, as you the customer is whom has made Valve what we are today.

    November 8th, 2005 at 5:57 am

20. EliteXero says:

    I’m not defending valve here, but it’s not impossible that your brother’s steam account was ‘borrowed’ and hacked on.

    November 8th, 2005 at 6:00 am

21. Jason Fetzko says:

    I too have had this happen to me! I HAVE NEVER Cheated a day in my life and I logged into my steam account about a month ago now and it was banned for a cheating infraction and I was ticked off! Because I have never cheated! I mean I was playing with my clan scriming it up and then went to bed woke up and BAN I was banned, I am soo ticked off because I paid good money for the game and I also paid good money for HL2 and source but I mostly played 1.6 and now I can’t because valve is a big POS! DOWN WITH VALVE!

    November 8th, 2005 at 6:55 am

22. sigh... says:

    Sucks to be you but it bans for anything that gives you an advantage. It also bans for some tools for looking at demos to see if someone is cheating because it turn on hacks. You may want to look at all things you installed I bet somthing is not legit.

    November 8th, 2005 at 7:37 am

23. dew says:

    Only a matter of time these bans piss off some legitimate non-cheating users, causing them to file a class action law suit for causing grief and money, especially if they pay for another copy of the game.

    November 8th, 2005 at 7:53 am

24. ch0de says:

    Make sure he didn’t use no other application with CS:S. That might of been banned

    November 8th, 2005 at 8:05 am

25. Andras Donaszi says:

    I was finished with Valve at HL2. They will not force me to do the stupid internet-verification sh#t for jut installing their game when it was available for download 2 days after it came out. I sold my copy and forgot about these people.

    November 8th, 2005 at 8:23 am

26. Alice says:

    From an email:

    If you have proof of this, you could file a complaint with the BBB (www.bbb.org). No? Just have to get other people to complain, too. Otherwise, they won’t contact Valve.

    November 8th, 2005 at 10:27 am

27. Chris says:

    Never been banned, but I can say that the steam forums are absolute shit unless you’re there to blow sunshine up valves ass. I posted a simple question after a software update that made my game nearly unplayable, the thread lasted about a day with some useful information comming in from other posters when *BAM* the thread just went away, along with all of my other posts (no, I wasn’t banned from the forum, just my posts were gone) …..asshats if I’ve ever seen them…

    November 8th, 2005 at 11:10 am

28. Michael B says:

    I recently had the same problem I went to a script site because a freind told me you can’t be banned for scripts. I also went to the steam forums and saw the topic on how you can and can’t be banned and it said buying scripts are not a bannable offence. Then I downloaded a good one and made it so I could buy all my favorite stuff with 1 button and I enjoyed not haveing to click around for gernades and other items. Then I loggin to get the STEAM ACCOUT BANNED FOR CHEATING INFRACTION for both Counter Strike Source and Half Life 2 I was very mad. Then my freind who used a diffrent script got banned the next day. So I waited for awhile and decided to try and play again. Well for one valve has their ban screen all wrong “you are banned from SOME secure servers” I think sum is supposed to mean ALL cause they changed all servers to vac and very few don’t have vac. Which is realy gay and now they changed it so that you can run vac in “silent mode” so it doesnt pop up saying its vac and then you end up being banned anyways. Also I was realy P/O when I go on and I play alittle to find out Im unbanned when I get the BANNED FOR BLA BLA BLA so I went to the steam forums and posted that if you get unbanned there should be a pop up screen to tell you your unbanned and should delete all files or whatever else but no they just like to fraud you of your money and say “Oh we were so nice as in to unban you”I got a very warm welcome from all the nice people of the steam forums.. flamed topic closed so on so fourth so now Ive moved on to better games and better things that don’t have the words valve and steam…

    November 8th, 2005 at 12:16 pm

29. Tech Wasteland :: Valve Banning Innocent Steam Accounts :: November :: 2005 says:

    […] d

    November 8, 2005 Valve Banning Innocent Steam Accounts Filed under: Digg Valve seems to be banning random, and innocent steam IDs Comments » The U […]

    November 8th, 2005 at 1:20 pm

30. 2.2. says:

    sry dude it happens they banned my cs source/1.6 one for some reason too but meh i have to use my other one now. Yup and now they are not removing bans so bah

    November 8th, 2005 at 5:30 pm

31. mada says:

    oh my god i hate valve the’r gay now!

    November 9th, 2005 at 3:21 pm

32. ]GC[HellBent says:

    How refreshing….I was gonna start a site over this crap if I didn’t come across anything…lol.

    So here’s my experiences….strap yourself in. Remember about a year ago when they disabled 20,000 accounts for reasons like fraud, etc. Then a month later they disabled 30,000 accounts. Well…I was one of the 20,000. I fire up Steam one day and get the “account disabled” message…WTF? I open a support ticket…..I wait…I wait…I wait some more….I finally resort to posting in the forums…big mistake. They have a creed over there: “Guilty with no possibility of innocence”. It sure would be nice to live in that perfect world they’re in. So another day goes by and finally a “canned” generic response to my ticket telling me the account will not be re-activated. WTF? I reply to the ticket…this time attaching a scan of my cd case (CD key) and receipt (proof of purchase). Another day or two goes by and I get another generic reply basically echoing the first. So off to Best Buy I go….pissed as could be…I return my game telling them the key was disabled and I couldn’t play it…and get a new one (it was the Collectors Edition by the way..in case you were wondering what moron would pay that much more for a t-shirt). So that was that….got my game…will never buy another Valve/Steam product…all was well.

    So over the Summer my son and I started playing a lot of CS:S. So much so, that I setup a clan and website for him and we began recruiting friends, etc. This is where my good friend comes in. Good guy…best friend…known him for a very long time. Not to mention he’s got more IT related certificates than I could carry and a pretty good guy to have on staff as far as administration is concerned. So he goes out and buys one of the HL bundles via Steam a few weeks ago just in time for a local LAN party we were going to. All is well…we all start playing quite a bit. Over the last few weeks we suspected a couple frequent players on our server of hacking. Neither he nor I knew much about what hacks were available, etc. so we didn’t really know what to look for to determine whether or not someone is hacking and if they’re worthy of a ban from our server. The last thing we want to do is ban a really good player just because we “think” he’s hacking. But the hackers can have a really negative impact on our server’s player stats. So one night we get out of the game and decide to do some surfing around for hacks to learn more about them and what to look for. We were messaging each other the entire time informing each other of what we found. We d/l’d a few different ones and read their docs, etc. Whatever we could do to familiarize ourselves with how they worked. Never ran them…and certainly never played with them…we know that stuff is on “delayed” banning and certainly weren’t going to risk getting our accounts banned from VAC just to “try one out”. And that was that…learned what we felt we needed to and can better detect a hacker on our server….a good day’s work in our minds.

    That brings us to today. He fires up CS:S this morning and gets the ban notice. Nice. Never hacked….never violated any portion of that EULA they hide behind…and no recourse of any sort is available to him other than disputing it with his credit card company. Some will say “Well you downloaded hacks!…you should get banned!” Morons. How is an admin going to monitor his server for hackers if he doesn’t research what to look for? And anyways…guns don’t kill people…people kill people. There is nothing “illegal” about d/l’ing a hack and doing so is in no way a violation of that EULA they’re always ranting about.

    With Steam, VAC, and their EULA the consumer has ZERO rights. They say what’s right and wrong (the software) and to make it even better they won’t even tell you what “unacceptable” behavior you’re being accused of or what “unacceptable” is for that mattter!! For example….what is a “hack”….what does Steam/VAC scan for so I know what NOT to have on my computer…etc..etc. The moral of the story is someone who has NEVER been a cheater, never played the game with a hack on, a clan admin and promoter of the game…..has gotten the ban. It’s just a sorry excuse for an anti-cheat solution. And who pays??? Ultimately Valve will pay. He’ll contest the charges on his credit card…get his $50 back..then spend $20 to only get what he needs to play…and Valve has to deal with it all…over someone NOT using a cheat! But whether or not he gets his money is irrelevant. Good admin’s are harder to come by than good games. If the admin can’t play…then the clan will be finding a new game to play…simple as that.

    I can’t wait for the day when a class action comes together on them. It probably won’t happen over a game but wait until they try their “God” tactics with some business software.

    So where are we now? Well….I’ll have to disable VAC on my server which will welcome the hackers which will destroy our player stats and ultimately our clan’s CS:S play…the reason for researching the hacks in the first place.

    No more Valve/Steam products will find their way onto my computer….unless it’s hacked of course:)

    l8r

    November 9th, 2005 at 3:25 pm

33. David Johnston says:

    Wow, I’m sorry to hear that. BTW, I plan on doing a follow-up to this article in the near future when my brother’s predicament has been further resolved.

    November 9th, 2005 at 3:51 pm

34. ]GC[HellBent says:

    What I think you’ll see happen here if they keep this system is the price of their games going through the roof. Think of all the extra cost they’re going to have into policing all of this….the support system (worthless anyways), all the pissed off retailers with returned goods, all of the credit card disputes (warranted or not doesn’t matter..still have to be handled by someone), all of the Better Business Bureau and Consumer Protection filings, etc…etc. Someone’s going to have to pay for it all…and it’s gonna be the gamer.

    I can’t tell you how many times I see the butt-lickers over at the steam forums talk about how much money Valve is retaining/making because the hackers can’t hack and have to pay to play. What?? Hackers don’t buy games. They’re not making money off the hackers thanks to their security system. If the game can’t be hacked they’ll play something that can. The vast majority of the people using wall-hacks, aim-bots, etc. are the l33t….they’re not gonna buy a game. Even if a few did it’s not going to offset the overhead of this flawed anti-consumer system they’re using.

    It’s a shame though…I do like playing CS…but I like playing BF2 just as much and you know what….I haven’t had a single complaint in regards to BF2….well..except that I had to fork over the dough for a new graphics card for my son’s box so he could play it too:)

    Take care….

    November 9th, 2005 at 4:33 pm

35. Dan says:

    You only get banned from VAC secured servers, not from all online play. Read your own quoted material, clown. This is far from news, rather a blog-type rant. Why am I not surprised those who get banned scream, “I don’t cheat! Not once! Never.” And it’s his ‘brother’ that got banned… :rolleyes:

    November 10th, 2005 at 5:33 pm

36. David Johnston says:

    You obviously didn’t read the article because I said specifically: “He told me that his account had been banned from playing on VAC-secured Counter-Strike:Source servers for a “cheating infraction”.”

    Also, if something like this happened to someone you knew wouldn’t you try and help him or her out? I guess not :-/

    November 10th, 2005 at 8:43 pm

37. Devon says:

    Just recently the other day, I had gotten home from school and logged into Steam as I usually would do on a normal day. I open up Counter-Strike:Source to play on one of the svereal servers in my favorites list, only to find out I had been banned for some kind of cheating infraction, when never in the two months that I have owned this game cheated. Never have used custom skins, sounds, drivers, or anything. I contacted Valve about this mishap, and they replied with the following message.

    “Hello,
    Your account has been banned by VAC because it has been detected cheating on a VAC enabled server. Custom skins, sounds, etc. will not get you banned. You can still play single-player games or on non-secure servers through Steam (you can filter the server list in Steam to show “Insecure Servers” only (from the main Steam menu -> Servers -> Anti-Cheat -> “Insecure Only”). We will not disclose the cheats that were detected running on your system or the date and time the infraction took place. We will not unban your account. Use of your Steam account is your own responsibility.” - JeffH

    After having read this message I began to search for other people that have had the same problem as I. I too ran across other people having encountered the same problem. I’m currently in the process of writing out another e-mail to send to Valve about this problem, in hopes of having my account unbanned. I will post any progress that I make with Valve.

    November 11th, 2005 at 3:11 am

38. David Johnston says:

    And the saga continues. I wonder what happened to the manual review:

    “Hello,
    Your account has been banned by VAC because it has been detected cheating on a VAC enabled server. Custom skins, sounds, etc. will not get you banned. You can still play single-player games or on non-secure servers through Steam (you can filter the server list in Steam to show “Insecure Servers” only (from the main Steam menu -> Servers -> Anti-Cheat -> “Insecure Only”). We will not disclose the cheats that were detected running on your system or the date and time the infraction took place. We will not unban your account. Use of your Steam account is your own responsibility.” -Bob

    Now, I think it’s a strange coincidence that you and my brother got the *exact* same, impersonal message back. My brother also got this reply within 24 hours. I personally don’t think that they actually did review the ban as they said they would on their forums because they don’t mention it. My brother has responded asking them to do specifically that. We’re waiting to see what happens, but it’s already been more than a day with no response. I’m going to give Valve a week before doing a followup on this story to let people know the results. So far, it looks like Valve is just BS’ing people to get them off their back

    November 11th, 2005 at 6:12 am

39. ]GC[HellBent says:

    I like how easy they’ve made it to even open a ticket now. The tab doesn’t even show until after you do an faq search. Wonder how many issues they’ve AVOIDED having to handle since they set that up. Most “n00b5″ would never figure it out. Real nice….

    Take care….

    November 11th, 2005 at 4:07 pm

40. Weps says:

    Simple question:

    Where exactly does it say in any of these threads that people have been unbanned?

    November 12th, 2005 at 12:07 pm

41. Mootah says:

    If you believe VAC to be so flawed, why are you so obsessed with access to VAC-enabled servers? After all, that’s the only thing you’re losing when flagged by Valve.

    You can play all the servers that don’t have the software you’re complaining so loudly about, and a large number of those nonVAC servers do have anti-cheat technology you might like better.

    As for being unable to run your own server don’t make me laugh. You can have a server of your own with no technical skills for $2/month per player: http://www.clanservers.com/game_servers/css-counter-strike-server.php

    When Valve didn’t have it’s own anti-cheat system, third party groups made excellent anti-cheat software and people whined because it wasn’t official. Now Valve devotes more resources to an official anti-cheat system, while still letting people have the option of using the third party systems, and what happens? People attack them while begging to get in. Pathetic. This bandwagon is heading right off a cliff.

    Also, have any of you considered that the admins running those servers are choosing to use VAC on purpose? That means the server admins think keeping VAC enabled is more important than keeping you as a player. But nobody is suggesting contacting server admins to stop using this flawed software are they?

    November 14th, 2005 at 7:33 am

42. David Johnston says:

    Actually, my brother and I are server admins and do run our own server which is VAC secured. I didn’t say that VAC was worthless, just that it makes mistakes. You, as most who have complained about the article, did not read very thoroughly or you would have known that I already know about HLGuard and stuff like that from being friends with one of the people who maintained it a few years ago and being in a clan with another person who worked on it under the Z-Project.

    November 14th, 2005 at 8:42 am

43. Joe says:

    “We will not disclose the cheats that were detected running on your system or the date and time the infraction took place.”

    Wow, talk about justice. Even a fool knows that’s not standard practice in enforcement unless your name is Mr. or Mrs. Rosenburg.

    November 14th, 2005 at 4:24 pm

44. Hunter says:

    Well their bans only stopped me from being able to connect to VAC secured servers on CS1.6, all my half life mods and origional half life games, and cs zero. However, I can play ANY HL2 game, mod, and CS:S. I can play tem on VAC secured servers.

    November 15th, 2005 at 5:38 pm

45. dylanva says:

    Another me too…

    My sons account was VAC banned for cheating. I am 99.99999% positive he has not cheated (not 100% like Valve).

    They will not give you any proof of why they banned your account and they won’t tell you what file(s) triggered the ban. So, you’re supposed to spend another $60 and if the same file happens to be on your system, your going to get nailed again.

    Now lets suppose someome else hijacked your account. They should be able to give us a host IP. At least that way I’ll have some confidence that it’s not a problem with his system. Other online providers actually try to help their customers and protect them from identity theft.

    With Valve it’s one strike and you’re out, with no warning and no sympathy.

    I hate cheaters and hackers as much as the next guy.
    All I am asking for is for Valve to work with their honest customers, even if their account gets hijacked and is used by a cheater.

    If your car gets stolen and is used in a homocide, should you get the death penalty without a trial?

    November 15th, 2005 at 8:38 pm

46. ]GC[HellBent says:

    It’s obvious there is a problem with both Steam and VAC. Almost every respected “authority” in the gaming community recognizes the flaws with Steam and VAC and it’s enforcement policies/procedures. You can find articles about it all over the net. Whether people choose to believe ALL of the “whiners” or not….let me just say this…hackers and/or cheaters would not be complaining like we are…they’d just hack and cheat again and carry on. Honest people are having their games STOLEN from them. How many people is it okay to have this happen to? 10…1,000…10,000…100,000? I guess time will tell. How many support tickets should I have to open before getting some personal attention?

    As far as cheating is concerned VAC has done NOTHING!! There are more cheaters today than there ever were. Private hacks go undetected by VAC for months at a time…you call that a good anti-cheat solution? They can’t guard against them until they actually get their hands on them to see what they’re doing. And even then they delay the bans for weeks….letting the hackers play that much longer. And this is supposed to make it harder on the hackers…..please. In a day or two another hack is spread through the underground and they’ve got another few months of playtime. Cheating Death was onto something…steambans.com is onto something…Autobans from the Z Project is onto something. VAC is just worthless when you compare it to Anti-cheat systems like these.

    For the person who said those banned from VAC can just go play on non-VAC servers….you’re missing the point entirely.

    Take care…

    November 17th, 2005 at 5:51 pm

47. Weps says:

    Only two kind of people have this ‘vac makes mistakes’ posture:

    1) people who got banned (whether they know or do not know why)

    2) people who like to get attention just by rambling on issues which are then taken completely out of perspective, example below:

    [quote]
    Almost every respected “authority” in the gaming community recognizes the flaws with Steam and VAC and it’s enforcement policies/procedures.
    [/quote]

    Just for the fun of it, give me three links to your so called respected ‘authorities’ in the gaming community that thinks vacs rules are flawed. (And I dont mean three links to a forumpost on e.g. www.steambans.com where a joker is venting his anger about his ban)

    Vac is not a court, it’s not (part of) a justice system. If you think it is, you should have gotten yourself a lawyer when buying and playing the game. (And if you can’t afford one, none will be appointed to you.)
    You might have better learned how to configure your computer so it is ‘hack’ free and stays hack free.
    Your account, your responsibility. If you dont know what happened with it, don’t blame it on Vac when you get banned.

    Enfin, from all issues with people that were banned and sincerely didnt know why they were banned only ONE (I know of) persued the case and had Valve help him find the cause for the ban. Afterwhich he accepted his ban. Most others are still posting all over the internet that vac sucks and it makes mistakes. Right.

    Furthermore I have not seen any evidence that people were banned unjust and have been unbanned. (Excluding the two cases were hlamp was detected as a hack).

    But feel free to post a valve reply (including mail headers) saying ’sorry, we made a mistake, you were banned by mistake, you are now unbanned.’

    Until then (which is probably when I get banned), vac is ok.

    November 25th, 2005 at 4:51 am

48. shrewd says:

    what the hell, this news story proves nothing. all it would have taken is for your brother to get curious once and thats it…. we’re supposed to take the article on face value? THIS PROVES NOTHING besides the fact that there are a lot of people out there with rediculous stories about how VAC is wrong….

    your all idiots, between me and my clan members we have upwards of 30 accounts, and not one of them is banned….

    November 26th, 2005 at 8:56 pm

49. homer_says says:

    Sorry, but you ‘know’ your brother does not cheat? that’s BS, unless you’ve stood behind EVERYTIME he’s ever played you have no way of backing that statement up.

    the flaw is in your logic not that of VALVE’s. VAC bans for ACTIVE KNOW CHEATS, running in MEMORY, while CONNECTED TO A VAC ENABLED SERVER - nothing else.

    There are no random bans. Bans are logged and then audited before being implemented.

    A cheat WAS detected on your brother’s account - end of story. Your word that he’s not a cheat is not a good enough basis to ‘prove’ that VAC is flawed!

    November 27th, 2005 at 12:22 am

50. alex says:

    Some of these post make me angry. I run my own public 32 slot server, everyone is welcome. One day i fly to paris come back three days later log on too ym server and im banned. I couldnt believe my wonderful eyeballs. Why on earth would the owner of a server (me) who knows it is VAC protected use cheats?!?!?!?!?!? I have never been so angry in my life. I have opened a support ticket with steam, but after reading this thread im about as optimistic as my garden plants. I think ill try and persue this a little further. I am NOT going to buy another copy of this game simply so that i can be admin on teh server that i have set up. If they dont answer my support ticket ill lie adn say someone has stolena dn hacked my account; then they will be forced to give me a new one . Stupid as this sounds, it ahs happened to a friend of mine and they did indeed supply him with a new account. Best of luck to my fellow counter strikers. Pop into ym server and give me a buzz 195.242.237.126:27045

    November 27th, 2005 at 11:10 am

51. Aliz says:

    I too was banned a few months ago. When or why exactly I am not sure, as I stopped playing CS for a few months to play WoW, but when DoD:source was released I hopped on steam to give it a whirl. When I tried to hit a server I was informed I was banned for cheating, which is impossible because I I don’t cheat (cheating practically ruined CS1 for me, why would I cheat?) and I hadn’t even been active on the game in months. I checked the forums and saw their high-and-mighty stance towards their “infallible” VAC system and vowed never to buy a game from Steam or Valve again. Hell, I encourage games to detect and enforce rules against cheaters, but when a company permanently bans users who are innocent they have crossed the line. Their support page is quite insulting, too. I didn’t cheat. VAC DOES make mistakes. You are full of it, Steam.

    December 6th, 2005 at 1:48 pm

52. ]GC[HellBent says:

    And Steam screws up again!!

    As it occasionally does….Steam doesn’t “remember” my password so I have to re-enter it. Other than being an inconvenience this hasn’t been much of an issue. But tonight I enter my password and it says either the account doesn’t exist or the password is invalid. I haven’t changed my password! If I do the retrieve account thing, I get the email with the code and then the SECRET question I’m supposed to provide the answer to in order to reset my password. You’re gonna love the secret question:
    “What did customer support last reset your passphrase to?” Now what kind of frickin’ question is that to ask a person who is having password trouble? Are these people completely retarded? So obviously that whole procedure doesn’t work. So I submit a ticket and wait….lord only knows how long. Needless to say I won’t be practicing with my clan tonight for a league match on Tuesday. Nice job Valve!! I just love it when AGAIN I can’t play the games I’ve paid for!

    Take care,
    ]GC[ HellBent

    December 9th, 2005 at 7:40 pm

53. terek says:

    hi, i’m a CS player, i’ve been banned by a french server, they now have deban me and i’m still banned in steam by VAC … that’s really boring, please tell me if there is something to do you know… thx

    December 10th, 2005 at 4:15 am

54. David Johnston says:

    Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be anything you can do really. Valve claims that my brother had hacks on his computer still and will not unban the account. You’re basically SOL and you’ll have to go buy the game again if you want to play. Don’t tell my brother, but I got him Halo for PC for a Christmas present

    December 10th, 2005 at 6:54 am

55. Guy Love says:

    It’s funny, I purchased HL2 for the kids last X-Mas, only to discover upon installation the super fine print that an internet connection was required. My problem was dial-up, 47 hours to download a game I just purchased for $50? WTF! Anyway, I couldn’t return it because I opened the box. It was also interesting how PC Gamer somehow failed to comment on this new approach to gaming in all of their sterling reviews of HL2. I decided not to install HL2 (plenty of other games that we wanted to play), and cancelled my subscription to PC Gamer.

    Here is the problem:

    1) The gaming publishing industry owns the gaming magazine critics and most of the big gaming sites (they are the biggest advertisers afterall), so they snuck this one past the consumer.

    2) For such a critical issue like STEAM, there should have been ample warning about it on the box in fairness to the purchaser. I do not consider microprint at the bottom of the system requirements as ample warning. If distributors don’t clean this up on the packaging side, it could lead to a class action lawsuit for false advertisement / misleading packaging.

    3) Valve made a ton of money this time around, so they are smug and full of themselves. I bet their revenues would have been cut in half if casual consumers had known the downside of purchasing HL2. I also fully expect a class action lawsuit to appear from their abusive cancellation of legitimate customer’s accounts. There is no way they can claim no ‘false positives’ from a statistical perspective. What a load of crap.

    4) The kneepad HL2/STEAM apologists (mainly extreme gamers and Valve employees) who disregard just how pissed off most casual consumers are don’t help the situation.

    What Valve doesn’t realize is consumers have long memories, and most people will avoid purchasing something that is full of headaches and causes serious inconvenience. In the long run, it will definitely impact their bottom line and make them wish they had never come up with the stupid STEAM idea to begin with (see TurboTax / Intuit as an example of this).

    So Valve, congrats for screwing me out of my $50 and pissing my kids off at X-Mas! Keep it up, sounds like a winning business plan to me.

    December 12th, 2005 at 12:03 pm

56. tiger_007 says:

    OK…here is the thing. I purchased half life 2 silver few months ago. Suddenly from nowhere few days ago my steam account was disabled..i didn’t get any e-mails why this happened and when i tryed to retrieve a lost account nothing happened. So i just want to say that Steam really sux and they are stealing money from their costumers.

    December 19th, 2005 at 9:33 am

57. traxxasx says:

    i think steam is a POS. nothing is 100% ful proof, thats why there are called hackers out there, (not game hackers) they can get into anything and do lots of stuff just in time. i 2 was banned for a “cheating infraction” after there stupid update, steam doesent do anything to contact you BACK. if they got there money for there game there happy,i think someone should get all there things toghther make a case and take the creators of steam to court, and see if they change there mind about innocent banned accounts.

    December 20th, 2005 at 6:58 pm

58. Tim says:

    i have left a question for VALVe regarding my own account and i will post the info on here as soon as there is a reply…. i KNOW that it is going to be pathetic!!!!

    December 22nd, 2005 at 8:01 pm

59. Jon says:

    I completely agree, I loaded a Skin Pack, and then all of a sudden I could see through walls, and now I’m VAC banned, WTF VALVE!

    December 23rd, 2005 at 12:59 pm

60. Tim says:

    all he said was “he researched it and the ban was placed correctly” ..pretty pathetic .. i think

    December 23rd, 2005 at 4:57 pm

61. FUCK STEAM says:

    ok i love sierra games liek css but this is bull shit ive never cheated in ym live and hate ahckers and i got banned out of the blue for no goddamn resone they should tlel u why ur banned and what cheat to prove it i say someone sew them!!!@

    December 26th, 2005 at 8:59 pm

62. ximian says:

    I have been banned from Steam and don’t know WHY! I have a valid account paid a f… 100$ for the collection version and now it is worthless. I sent an email to support because I was getting kicked once in a while, saying my account was used somewhere else. Wanted Steam to change my information but they never got back to me. I have sent repeated emails to steam without any replies. If I receive no replies from them in the next week or so I will be seeing a lawyer to start a Class Action Suit. I am sure I will have a lot a people on board! I can tell you that this is the last time i purchase a VALVE software or anything that uses STEAM because I am STEAMED PISSSED!

    December 27th, 2005 at 9:06 am

63. ximian says:

    SPREAD THE WORD ABOUT THE C.A.S. Maybe we can get something going!

    December 27th, 2005 at 9:07 am

64. Meio Bit says:

    Valve Steam

    O Half-Life 2 bom, ningum discute. Eu esperava um jogo um pouco maior e alguma inovao de roteiro, para trazer um impacto semelhante ao primeiro. No geral, um bom jogo, melhor que o Doom 3 e por no…

    January 3rd, 2006 at 9:46 pm

65. SysRq says:

    This happened to me just yesterday. I was banned out of nowhere and I have never hacked. A few hours ago, I was unbanned but now I am banned again. I hope it goes away after a day or two, as said, but I read that Valve shuts off at certain times of the day (which is when you are unbanned).

    January 10th, 2006 at 3:56 pm

66. Ferius says:

    Well ive been banned on january 21 tho i did not do anything cheats mods hacks bots exlpoits but when i emailed valve steam they said u have “distributed us for 90 days” i answered with a what the hell are u talking about After that i complied with police about the company sooner police talked to valve steam i got my account back police were gonna shut it down for what they doing.

    EXAMPLE
    An example i play World of Warcraft then the company steals my visa or credit-card if u talk with the police a big problem will be created all beacause of stealing ONE vis or whattever

    WHAT IM SAYING
    What im saying is for all you people out there that play games stay away from cheats bots hacks mods all this shit it makes your life horrible and stay away from hacking friends might make u addictive to the cheats hacks bots mods all that shit.

    January 19th, 2006 at 2:38 pm

67. Jester says:

    My account was today banned and i sent a problem to the Valve support team and i got back an auto message refering me back to the forums where i already have been refered to 4 times b4 and then included in that same message they actually stated that i was hacking and that they didnt make a mistake.

    Also in one of their support forums in just 3 lines of text they had already used 3 foul words, this is no way to be treating customers who are jsut pissed of at how they have already screwed you around.

    What really pissed me off is i only bought the game 2 weeks ago and now forced to buy another and i had only played about 3 times b4.

    January 20th, 2006 at 10:16 pm

68. ScottyD says:

    “Hello,
    Your account has been banned by VAC because it has been detected cheating on a VAC enabled server. Custom skins, sounds, etc. will not get you banned. You can still play single-player games or on non-secure servers through Steam (you can filter the server list in Steam to show “Insecure Servers” only (from the main Steam menu -> Servers -> Anti-Cheat -> “Insecure Only”). We will not disclose the cheats that were detected running on your system or the date and time the infraction took place. We will not unban your account. Use of your Steam account is your own responsibility.” - JeffH

    I was reading through this article along with the replies from other angry Steam users. The above response from JeffH has appeared many times in the responses above and was also sent to me. I was playing in office one day and playing quite well as I am a reasonably good player who tops a fair few maps. Some guy said to me eventually that he was demoing me and would be sending it off to Steam. I didn’t think that would be a problem as I thought Steam Admin’s of all people would be able to see in a second that I wasn’t hacking. However! About a week later I tried to log into my account only to find that I had been banned for a hacking infraction. So I wrote to Steam support as that is all I could think of doing and got the above reply. So I wrote back and requested at least a real reply from a real person and for what was I banned for. Again a copy and paste job even though it was different and this time I was told that they wouldn’t tell me what the reason was. SO! I wrote back for the third time pleading with them to take this seriously as I had never hacked before and to take another look at the demo. I also stated that I’m just one teenager who can’t exactly take a big company to court so I would really like some help as I have no where else to go. He wrote back and said…”Your account will not be unbanned. This will be my final reply on this topic.” I couldn’t believe how rude they were and how little they care for their customers. It’s sad because I’m sure all the people who created the game are really nice people while all the people in charge of dealing with customers are such a complete bunch of wankers. The people in charge of Steam really do need to look at how their employees as they are actually stealing from people like me and I’m sure many of others like me aren’t sure how to or can’t take on a company liek Valve.

    January 24th, 2006 at 7:58 pm

69. David Johnston says:

    Wow, I’m amazed that this post is still getting replies even months after it was posted. I think that most, if not all, of the people who are claiming to be in a similar situation are telling the truth. It seems unfair to me that Valve won’t even tell you what you were specifically banned for. While this may “help” hackers, Valve should also be concerned about the innocent people that they’re banning. We literally have no method to fight a VAC ban.

    Also, Valve is an incredibly profitable company from what I’ve read. I’d think they could spare a bit of money on *decent* support that doesn’t go straight from copy + paste to rude.

    January 24th, 2006 at 8:08 pm

70. Idieeasy says:

    I dont usually play the online games at all(stoneage dialup)but i do play the single player cz games and I have a major complaint about all the bugs i encounter like crashes to the desktop when i click the inventory window up to choosing teammates and the game crashes. Loosing my internet connection and the steamy piece of crap cuts out on me again and takes forever to boot back up too.

    Theres alot of bugs in the levels of cz too like bots getting stuck in the same places e.g. little Italy i think, where the terrorists get stuck in the 2nd story room and act like retards because they cant usually find the ladder.

    I am not bought on the steam concept. I bought their game and its more of a chore to play it than it is to boot up another game that actually works correctly. I vow to never pay for another one of their games.

    I know this was far off the topic of vac banning, but i dont think its good buisiness sence to piss off customers especially what 20,000 at a time after updating, come on update the crap you shoud be doing like fixing the bots. If anybody wants to debunk anything i have written then “fuck you” anyone relates then “cool”. fin

    January 28th, 2006 at 9:33 pm

71. Alex says:

    Hi My Name is Alex I Was Banned from steam and my IP Is Also banned wich means even if i purchase a game i wont be able o play it reason i was banned was because I Had My CSName P13

    January 28th, 2006 at 10:49 pm

72. godlikeno1 says:

    i have just been on the vac website and it is fucking usless. i have been banned from vac servers i clicked on the link provided and it gave me a (page not found)
    the funny thing is i had a day were i got 70 kills to 6 odd deaths. and another server i was only on an afk of 12-3 but it was all pistol kills. after having a couple off good days i find my self banned the day after. i wondered if that was why.i have left my cousin to play my game at my house wilst i was out, he doesnt know my account details and doesnt own a pc he doesnt even know how to shut one down how to shut 1 down. so i wouldnt see how he could find a hack. but i now know through finding there site that u are held responsible for urr account and if they did hack u get an irreversible permanent ban. so in effect if u have this game no1 else u know is allow to play on your version. if i cant get an unban the valve can screw them selves and will recive as much bad publicity as i could possibly manage to give them

    February 27th, 2006 at 2:47 pm

73. godlikeno1 says:

    i think valve needs to be notified of this page it makes no mistakes but yet in 3-4 months look at the replies it has had with pissed of customers who more than likly like my self are not gonna by another valve game and are gonna put as much negative response about there products as possible.
    but then again it seems like they dont give a flying fuck

    February 27th, 2006 at 3:02 pm

74. evolv3 says:

    the long and the short of it is that nothing valve do is illegal unless someone makes it so. Example: you may have no hacking record, never hacked in your life, but if valve ban you, thats it and the only way to regain your dignity, money, and time is to fight valve. Very few have the time to do this, and simply go with it, either accepting their losses or purchasing the games again. This way valve retain their profits regardless of how disgruntled the customer is.

    March 1st, 2006 at 8:55 pm

75. jimmy says:

    ok so i was playing counter strike, my daily activity when all of a sudden it something popped up and said i have been banned from that server, i was thinking to myself had my friend banned me from his server as a joke. I asked my friend that very same day, and he replied, “no i did not bann you from my server”. I was looking for a reason and i had not cheated or did anything wrong. I then opend counter strike after a few days and i could get into vac servers again so i was happy and i thought that it was just a error that valve had made so they undid it, but then i turned off my computer and that next day i tried to get back into thhat same server and i couldnt get into it anomore. So i thought to myself once again about this problem and i thought it would just be another error and it would be fixed by tomorrow morning. I woke up and i hurried to the computer to play counter strike and it did not work still.

    March 13th, 2006 at 4:52 pm

76. kelvin says:

    This is true!!! i am now banned for no reaon! Yo these people gatta get there banning straight! I did nothing at all and when my firned clals me to play dod or cs it says my account is banned. luckly my CS:S account isnt but my other games are.

    March 15th, 2006 at 5:29 pm

77. Shawn says:

    I have also been banned, yet I have never cheated. My account sometimes becomes unbanned but most stayes banned. So now, I guess I need to go find out how to creat a ticket.

    March 16th, 2006 at 4:47 pm

78. Terry says:

    woooooooow i have been banned too heres a thread that valve recently closed i wonder why, there was no swearing nothing. I had been banned on 1 of my accounts for a cheating infraction I did not deny it as my brother probably dled hacks 2 months ago and yea i got banned. However, VAC’s stupidity went overboard and they banned my other 2 accounts. THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO FUCKING WAY I HACKED ON THE OTHER 2 ACCOUNTS How you ask? well for starters my last account i forgot my PW because i havent even played on it over 2 years atleast i changed my PW for the first time yesterday and try go on a server YOU HAVE BEEN BANNED now i am questioning their credibility on the other bans, are they doing this on purpose to get some money from their customers its fucking outrageous DO THEY HAVE ANY COMMONSENSE WHAT SO EVER ever time u submit a steam ticket they constantl link you the fucking “terms and condition” page like wow, is that what there getting paid for fucking good for nothing customer support. GG VAC http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4451818#post4451818

    March 17th, 2006 at 10:58 am

79. Derek says:

    omg… today i went on to my cs game went into my favorite serv. and was banned from vac.. i dont cheat or hax.. although i have custom skinz and sprayz… rite after a steam update… i clicked on the “more details” button… it brought me to my browser and what happened.. the site was unable to be found… GREAT JOB VALVE YOU BUNCH OF FUCK UPS!!!

    March 19th, 2006 at 9:35 am

80. Aiden says:

    hey my account got banned a few days ago for no reason my computer hasnt even been on for 3 days and when i turned it on and decided to play counter strike i was banned from my VAC servers, like wtf, i dont even noe y? so i sent an email and they just sed they cant unban me, u steam people are real “TIGHT” can ani one help me plz email me David Johnston u seem like a nice person to help an innocent cs player

    March 21st, 2006 at 2:32 am

81. Aiden says:

    just an udpate i logged onto my account again and i was allowed to enter to view the welcome screen to find my self permanatly banned again and the message said check your console now when i checked my console it says vac status in good standing wtf wtf wtf

    March 21st, 2006 at 2:46 am

82. Aiden says:

    once again valve is pissing me off i was connecting to the vac server and it had something like checking ur green ticket or sum shit like tht i mean i didnt do ani green ticket wtf is tht aniwai so i tried again and unsuprisingly im only banned on one vac server and its my favorite one so why only 1 this time and wtf is happenint to my account thnks alot people tht help in advance

    March 21st, 2006 at 3:43 am

83. David Johnston says:

    Aiden, you can try deleting the clientregistry.blob file (search for it). This will check and verify all of your CS files the next time you log in. Make sure that you are not running Steam when you do that. Then you can try logging in again. Restarting your computer may also help. Other than that, there’s not much you can do. It sounds like it’s Valve’s fault, not yours.

    March 22nd, 2006 at 6:46 am

84. Aiden says:

    i tried that but it just updates when i open steam aniwai i cant logon now says something like im disconnected aniwais thnks ill jst buy another cs. thnks for ur help

    March 22nd, 2006 at 4:09 pm

85. gg says:

    I know there may be occurrences where someone has been wrongfully banned, but have you thought about how many actual cheaters are going to jump on this bandwagon, “oh i’ve been wrongfully banned too!.” This is pathetic.

    April 9th, 2006 at 8:47 am

86. CronTZ says:

    I’m not sure how things has worked out, but I was banned (wrongfully)and found myself on better terms with BF2. Hell if I’ll buy another Valve POS.

    That made for an interesting reading. I don’t get why anyone could be such fanboys. Discrediting such possibly serious flaw(s) that could affect a lot of people (and it has). I mean Valve itself carries on so unprofesionally. “can you guess why we have that in the FAQ?”, wtf does that mean, what a snide, condescending remark. The FAQ is confusing, period. People have been sued for more coherent reasons.

    *@(! Valve, they can’t even make their own online games. Name me one thats orginally theirs ?!? CS, DOD ?!? HAH. TF? you still play that crap ?

    April 17th, 2006 at 5:04 am

87. Weps says:

    [quote]I don’t get why anyone could be such fanboys.[/quote]

    It has nothing to do with being a fanboy, it has all to do with cheaters ruining games. Of course no one here ever cheated. And of course all here are 100% sure that no one accessed their account. And also all here are for 100% sure that not a single ‘hack’ ran when connected to a vac secure server.

    I’m still waiting to see the “valve screwed up, they unbanned me” part. But of course, it’s much easier to (un)willingly cheat and just blame the ban on VAC/Valve than trying to get your account rightfully unbanned. .

    May 6th, 2006 at 8:25 am

88. SoPaas says:

    How Unban?

    June 22nd, 2006 at 7:14 pm

89. Rae says:

    Valve should have a time limit on the ban because I think it is too harsh to ban their customors permanatly. They’re so mean but I think they do this because they will make more money if you buy the game again.

    June 28th, 2006 at 11:02 pm

90. FUCK Steam says:

    Fucking vac ban shit with no hacks pisses me off. It says im banned for some reason then you click to find the reason and it doesn’t work.

    June 29th, 2006 at 11:22 pm

91. Mammoth says:

    Yeah well basically i logged on to my steam account today and found that it was banned. For no reason. I have no hacks cheats or crap like that on my computer and today i logged on and couldnt get on my clan server. This topic has been good reading and hopefully i shall be able to sort mine out soon.

    July 1st, 2006 at 4:18 am

92. John says:

    Yes today i signed on my account and for no reason it says something like u hav been banned for cheating and insecure blah blah blah. i tried to email Steam and the reply i get is this “Unfortunatly we do not unban accounts for any reason, remove all ur cheating systems and purchase the game on a different account and so on…..” and the thing is i told them it jus got banned for no reason without cheating but they tr0eat you like Vac is perfect and that im guilty for something i didnt do. Also the funny thing is there is no customer calling. I find this complete bullshit

    July 1st, 2006 at 1:57 pm

93. Eh says:

    I think that your lieing and your bros such a nub haxor !

    so STFU n00b

    July 18th, 2006 at 11:24 am

94. raven says:

    god bless there is a thing thats called NON steam css ore cracked steam clients ,no way of banning that

    August 4th, 2006 at 1:00 pm

95. sparts says:

    i also have been haveing this problem i was resently banned for god knows reason and now i spent idk $200 and played them no one has my pass steams vac is corupt randome bans also im posting this thread as a additonal info SEE VALVE SEE WAT YOR SO CALLED “VAC perfect little angel” DID TO THE WORLD IT AFECTED OWER POCKETS AND OWER LIVES I COULD OF INVESTED 200 IN COLLAGE TO WORK THERE NOW ITS JUST WASTED BECUS OF UR LITTLE ANGEL! (sry for the flameing its so frustrateing)

    August 4th, 2006 at 9:40 pm

96. Ray says:

    I have been reading through these posts and I am amazed that a company can get away with this crap. My name is Ray, and I’m one P.O.’d S.O.B. right now. Like many of you here, I have come home to find my steam account mysterisously banned for some unknown reason. Like many of you, I have gotten the same bs responses.
    =============
    Hello,
    Our system indicates that your account has been permanently banned by the Valve Anti-Cheat system (VAC) - unfortunately, the Steam support team is unable lift the ban.
    We are not able to disclose the cheats which were detected, nor can we provide the date and time the infraction took place. VAC has confirmed that the ban on your account was applied legitimately.
    This ban applies to a Steam account (regardless of whom was using the account at the time the infraction occurred) and any games registered under the account. The use and security of your Steam account is your responsibility.
    We cannot move game subscriptions from accounts which have been banned by VAC.
    The account may still be used to play single-player games or to connect to non-secure game servers and for games played over a LAN. Please change your filter settings in the server browser list to show servers which are not VAC-secured (from the Steam main menu go to the “View” option, select “Servers” and then select “Not secure” in the Anti-Cheat drop-down).
    Please do not register retail products or purchase new Steam subscriptions on a VAC-banned account. If you choose to purchase a new copy of the game, please register it or install it with a new Steam account. Remove all cheats from your system before you install (if you do not know where the cheats were installed, you may want to consider reformatting the machine and starting over with a new installation of your operating system).
    ====================================
    Please note how quick they are to suggest purchasing another copy of the game. Also, please note how they lie through their teeth and tell you they can’t unban you. Last, but by no means least, please note how they explain that they can not tell you when you were cheating or what cheat they caught you running. That one is legit because I wasnt running any cheat so they wouldn’t be able to give me specifics BECAUSE THEY HAVE NONE TO PROVIDE!!!
    Here is the second response by this crap they call customer service
    ================================
    Hello,

    This is not debateable, any further emails on the subject will be ignored.
    =================================
    well they’re going to have to ignore me because I’m NOT going to quit emailing them, and any other emails I can find for anybody at valve or steam. Now, before you go off thinking, ‘oh this is some kid that’s pissed because he can’t afford another copy of the game’, I own my own computer and networking center. I have purchased no less than between 35 to 50 LEGAL copies of this pathetic game to GIVE to friends and fellow gamers in and around Lafayette Parish in Louisiana. I shell out $200 a month to have a decent enough broadband connection to host gaming servers. I don’t live in an area with broadband, so I have setup a point to point wireless shot from 2 miles away that does have broadband. Buying another copy would not be a problem, but I refuse to purchase another copy of this, or any other game provided by valve or that has anything to do with valve or steam. These people will learn that they can not treat their customers this way. Oh, I just got this response to my latest email advising them that I would be consulting legal representation….
    ===================================
    Your request for assistance cannot be accepted because this account has been disabled.
    ===================================
    talk about customer service there. I think it’s time all of us who have been screwed by this company to band together, and run roughshod over it and run it into the ground. I also think it’s time that we show this company that WE, the customers, are the boss, not them, and I will be seeking some legal advice on this matter. If these idiots are going to screw me this bad, I think I should be given a refund for all the copies I purchased of their game (yes I still have all the receipts) and the pathetic excuse of a gaming engine they claim to be so great can be a thing of the past. I’m sure a high enough class action lawsuit would put enough of a hurting on these morons that they would think twice before screwing customers again.
    Just say no to anything to do with valve or steam!!!

    August 5th, 2006 at 11:30 am

97. Mark F says:

    I was banned by VAC, and have never cheated. I wouldn’t even know how to use a cheat. When I emailed them about it, they said “too bad”, “there are no false positives”, “we will not move your games to another account”, “We won’t tell you when this alleged cheat occured nor what it was” and “if you reply to us anymore on this issue, we will disable steam.”

    If anyone knows of a class action lawsuit against them, I would like to get in on it. I am very angry.

    August 9th, 2006 at 7:27 pm

98. nighT says:

    Que a Valve se exploda com esse VAC! Fui banido sem nunca ter usado um cheat… eh foda.
    da vontade de parar de jogar essa porra. tomar no cú!

    August 11th, 2006 at 8:28 pm

99. Joo says:

    I’d laugh so hard if someone just bombed valve, and then someone with half a brain bought them out.

    August 12th, 2006 at 5:47 pm

100. $hIzNiT says:

     VERY NICE SCREW UP STEAM!!

     A couple days ago, i was happily playing counterstrike when i needed to have dinner. When i came back to the computer and tried to log on my account, it had told me my username and/or password is invaild. So I tried the “retrieve a lost account” button, It sent me the verification code and it sent me the secret question. MAN was i suprised when they told me the question: What did customer support last reset your passphrase to? Then i thought for a second, WOOOOWWW HOW THE HECK WOULD I KNOW WHEN THATS WHAT IM TRYING TO FIGURE OUT!!
     Nice job steam, u wasted me $50

     August 23rd, 2006 at 1:30 pm

101. curtis says:

     I have now found out that I’m banned for some reason. You never mention in this article how to fill out a support ticket. Where do you go to find these?

     August 28th, 2006 at 10:37 pm

102. Lone Wolf says:

     I know for a fact that people who knows a bit of amx programming or event scripting for css could send cheat files around without the players knowing…..

     So my opinion would be that the cheat scanners and VAC is useless…
     Only demos revievd by others is good bans…….

     Just my 2 cents

     /Lone Wolf
     Enjoy getting older the only alternative is death!

     August 29th, 2006 at 8:07 am

103. DaRkGraVe says:

     Hello My Friends Were Playing In Vac secured Server With My Account. And They Were Using Cheats. One Day When I Started To Play I Saw That My Account Is Banned From VAC Secured Servers Please Can You Unban My Account I Promise It Woudnt Be Again. Thanks From Now GoodBye.

     August 30th, 2006 at 6:50 am

104. VAC TWO says:

     haha yeah right you didnt cheat of course “your Brother” cheated you dam fool.

     September 17th, 2006 at 5:03 pm

105. Lone Wolf lies says:

     Lone Wolf you can not be sent a cheat file from a cs server via amx of any other admin mod,its not possible.The half life/gldsrc engine and source engine do not allow those files types to be sent.

     September 17th, 2006 at 5:05 pm

106. Emenant says:

     Hmm… I have that problem too , It happened like so: I played in one server then after a while i played in lan, and after that i quited steam to go to my other account to play in hl2 (because i dont have hl2 in the previous account), and as soon as i went back to the previous account and click on a server. I find out that i was banned… I still don’t know whats going on and why theyve banned me… I’ve read some posts about steam banning people for no reason.. but they were no use D: …Any suggestions?.. Oh, if you think this comment was just another one of those stupid lyers then think to yourselfs.. why would i spend so much time looking for the answer? As well as why would i even bother typing out this much..?

     October 9th, 2006 at 7:31 pm

107. Omegaman says:

     I’ve made a complaint with the Better Business Bureau (www.bbb.org)… all the info required is;

     72.165.61.134

     OrgName: VALVE CORPORATION
     Address: 6101 S. 180TH STREET

     City: TUKWILA

     StateProv: WA

     PostalCode: 98188

     Country: US

     Comment:

     RegDate: 2006-08-02

     Updated: 2006-08-02

     AdminHandle: BMO65-ARIN

     AdminName: moslow, bryn

     AdminPhone: +1-425-889-2137

     AdminEmail: brynm@valvesoftware.com

     TechHandle: BMO65-ARIN

     TechName: moslow, bryn

     TechPhone: +1-425-889-2137

     TechEmail: brynm@valvesoftware.com

     # ARIN WHOIS database, last updated 2006-10-24 19:10

     # Enter ? for additional hints on searching ARIN’s WHOIS database.
     OrgID: VALVE-2
     Address: 6101 S. 180TH STREET
     City: TUKWILA
     StateProv: WA
     PostalCode: 98188
     Country: US

     NetRange: 72.165.61.128 - 72.165.61.191
     CIDR: 72.165.61.128/26
     NetName: Q0803-72-165-61-128
     NetHandle: NET-72-165-61-128-1
     Parent: NET-72-164-0-0-1
     NetType: Reassigned
     Comment:
     RegDate: 2006-08-03
     Updated: 2006-08-03

     RAbuseHandle: BMO65-ARIN
     RAbuseName: moslow, bryn
     RAbusePhone: +1-425-889-2137
     RAbuseEmail: brynm@valvesoftware.com

     OrgTechHandle: BMO65-ARIN
     OrgTechName: moslow, bryn
     OrgTechPhone: +1-425-889-2137
     OrgTechEmail: brynm@valvesoftware.com

     # ARIN WHOIS database, last updated 2006-10-24 19:10
     # Enter ? for additional hints on searching ARIN’s WHOIS database.

     Make a complaint… with enough complaints they won’t be able to do buisness in the US…. to bad so sad for them

     October 24th, 2006 at 11:00 pm

108. Ryan says:

     I installed Steam for the first time since last year, only to find I was VAC banned. I haven’t cheated. I can’t believe valve can ban innocent accounts, only to profit from it. I truly believe Valve has reached the point of greed.

     November 11th, 2006 at 1:57 am

109. Arran says:

     this happend to me but for like a day ut u tend to play on the old C-S 1.5 on the WON2 servers so if you play C-S and have a old copy of Half-Life or C-S Retail NON Steam then go to my site www.flick.gq.nu for a Guide on how to CVounter-Strike 1.5 up to play on the WON2 servers. then you will not have to use steam then there will be no fear of getting VAC banned for sod all

     January 7th, 2007 at 2:35 am

110. marcelo says:

     my god
     esse site é em ingles

     sadauhauhsdhasa

     mas então que se foda
     vocês não vão poder solucionar meu problema então
     poruqe eu não falo nem um pouco de ingleês
     asdhasuhuashuhdas

     abraço pra quem entender

     January 22nd, 2007 at 6:46 pm

111. bigdog01 says:

     my account was stolen from johnson(co admin) i want it back soon this is not cool, i hop you realize that i will get it back.

     February 26th, 2007 at 11:26 pm

112. C4.S says:

     i got my account banned for gettin 4 headshots in a row and i was leader of an expanding clan and cal i when some bastard from valve banned me cuz someone demoed me and said i was hackin wen IV NEVER FUCKIN HACKED IN MY LIFE AND I DONT EVEN FUCKIN KNOW HOW

     March 7th, 2007 at 12:46 pm

113. JackInABox says:

     Hey im just saying i got my steam acoount hacked and know its disabled because someone hacked on servers…
     I had about 200$ worth of games in there ill list them: Garry’s mod 10. Half life 2, Half life 2 deathmatch, Day of deafeat source, Garry’s mod 9, counter strike, counterstrike source, Half life loast coast.. and more games its RIDCOULOUSE

     March 12th, 2007 at 1:46 pm

114. VAC suks says:

     I was banned as well i have emailed vavle and steam many times with no replys and valve said they get too many emails and there reply may take along time. Now i heard that a temp ban is 5 years…. i dont think im going to wait 5 years to get back into counter strike. I was going to rebuy it but after i heard that people are getting unbanned im thinking about waiting cuase i dont like wasting my money but steam do giv a shit. How can a company just lock all your games up in one account.
     Also has any1 ever thought about getting there key reset then registering to a new account. And if you have how do u do it if you bought it online and dik heads dont give you a cd key??
     Good luk getting unban by those retards in fuking charge

     March 17th, 2007 at 6:39 am

115. toshi* says:

     well yeah i really think vac is being gay. i mean cmon dis is my second acount banned and i have no idea what i did and i really dont feel like buying another source acount *hint hint* - 30$ i think know but seriously if theres anybody that can call vac and tell them they did somthing wrong please contact me

     pinoyman_3000@yahoo.com

     March 17th, 2007 at 11:48 am

116. JackInABox says:

     Hey saying hey and no there is no way putting your already used game on different account. i tried a million times

     March 18th, 2007 at 10:53 am

117. IEatSteamForBreakFast says:

     Next time if really going to buy the game, just install 1 game in 1 account. Let them have fun banning all of your account.

     No wonder steam has so many haters.

     Steam is the boss, we are nothing but some fools who buys the game over again and again.

     I have deleted steam from my computer and will never touch them again in my life.

     Steam ->
     Who is your next hater?

     March 19th, 2007 at 8:05 pm

118. Hitman says:

     Probably i am it’s next hater. I got banned today due to a cheating infraction, the same problem as the maker of this page. Only i haven’t got unbanned since i don’t know how to contact the admins of steam. So if anyone has any usefull tips for me … please post them here. Thanks

     April 10th, 2007 at 2:27 am

119. Peter shafted says:

     Yeh I’m another steam victim, these rectum headed ass wipe noobs need to really need have a good look at their practices, my account and my sons were both disabled in one week, I emailed them asking questions, do I think I’ll get an answer…sure I will…I also believe the cheques in the mail and I wont come….well…you know the rest.

     April 10th, 2007 at 6:46 am

120. Steve Shafted By Valve says:

     I have logged in to find I am disabled as well.
     I sent a ticket…I suspect it to be restored eventually…but I had purchased quite a few games already…I mean WTF VALVE!!! WTF!!!

     April 10th, 2007 at 3:53 pm

121. Mr.Sandman says:

     HELP!! MY STEAM ACCOUT WAS BANNED AND I DIDN’T CHEAT OR DO ANY THING!!>>> HELPME PLZ!!!!!

     April 14th, 2007 at 6:42 pm

122. imparare says:

     Interesting comments..

     April 14th, 2007 at 10:05 pm

123. GC says:

     My account got hijacked, and then banned.

     I also posted a rule-abiding friendly question as to why VAC would ban my account for something I didn’t.

     I was INSTANTLY accused of cheating, and that VAC is perfect, and never makes mistakes. Which is entirely untrue.

     I’m thinking about gathering a bunch of my fellow peasants who have been mistreated by Valve, and boycott them until they go through their VAC system, fix the bugs, and unban all those who were wrongfully banned.

     April 19th, 2007 at 6:27 am

124. Nick Righter says:

     I believe they are. I filed a complaint with my attorney general. I suggest everone do the same as well and end this nonsense. I hadn’t even played on my account for 3 months and I logged on to find it banned.

     April 22nd, 2007 at 11:28 pm

125. BANNED says:

     YOU ARE ALL BANNED!
     BANNNNNNNNNEEEEEEEEDDDDDDDDD FORRRRRRR LIFFFFFEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

     VAC IS PERFECTTTT! IT EATS ACCOUNTS WHEN IT GETS HUNGRY!!!!!!

     April 23rd, 2007 at 10:37 pm

126. FUKIN VALVE says:

     my accout has been stolen and then banned after a message under authication verification code has told me my account was in danger and asked 4 my user name and password which i gave as i was scriming later that night i loged on to be banned WTF!!!! i was pissed of and valve dont give to shits valve are not perfect and never will be so FUK IM

     April 25th, 2007 at 10:20 pm

127. steam sucks says:

     wut cani say…steam really sucks…

     May 5th, 2007 at 10:14 pm

128. Ian says:

     Yeah, i dont cheat either, in fact, the server i was in has alot of cheaters, none of them get banned, just me, the one who doesnt. I have paid alot of money for these games, so Im PISSED. Im never playing on steam again, i hope they lose money, and i hope whoever designed VAC gets shot, cuz thats bs. i didnt cheat, but i get banned.

     May 21st, 2007 at 4:07 pm

129. MAD says:

     Valve is the walmart of the game companys. They make it so you can’t contact them for a refund. They ban accounts to force you to buy a new one. They have VERY POOR security. They claim you don’t own what you pay for. They have no customer service…

     VALVE JUST SUCKS!!!!!!!

     June 28th, 2007 at 7:39 pm

130. Jamie says:

     Hi, im am also an inocent victim of this banning i am now vac banned for no reason atall i will be tying 2 get unbanned but i dont see them doing anything

     July 2nd, 2007 at 1:39 am

131. Alex says:

     wow valve is really gettin gay now i hope nuthin happens to me i have played for bout’ 2 years now and im pretty good i usually caome in third at the end of a map i hope this doesent happen to me fyi i bouth the pack with th half life seiries and css

     July 9th, 2007 at 8:52 am

132. Rdao says:

     got steam banned for no reason . i can do nothing about it I’m sorry I bought the game though in the first place . Lot of money waste this is theft !!!!!
     Theft=valve . i saw cheaters cheating still i don’t know if they’re banned . I did not cheat but I got banned . this is relly great .

     August 14th, 2007 at 2:08 am

133. reddawg says:

     any class action suits, yet??
     Got the VAC bann’d crapola & had no cheats! 10 years of honest customer service shot in an O tolerance instant!!

     August 14th, 2007 at 5:34 am

134. Joe says:

     I had most Valve games on my Steam account like HL1, HL2, CSS and so on, and I was playing quite frequently… After a while I stopped playing but Steam remained installed on my old computer. When Red Orchestra was introduced to Steam I decided to pick it up again… And man, I got pissed when I saw that I had been VAC-banned so all the games I had and paid for were pretty much useless. Right now I hate Valve, oh yes I do. I hate VAC… I don’t see why they couldn’t let the server administrators themselves do the security job, like in the good old WON days? VAC is a very stupid idea and I just feel extremely mad that the games I paid for in hard cash won’t work as they are supposed to anymore.

     Give me WON back, or something. It worked flawlessly, goddammit.

     August 29th, 2007 at 3:21 pm

135. I got banned. says:

     I got banned by vac.

     i don’t know how to hack, cheat or something. I don’t even know the english well.

     November 14th, 2007 at 11:20 pm

136. Robert Oakley says:

     i would like to state that i have also been banned from vac and they are deffinately wrong for doing this i have never hacked or cheated on any game ever. I think its a sad day when they try to get more people who play the game already to go out and buy there product again this is obviously a stunt to make more money on vac and steams account i think the best solution is to go public with this problem write g4 im sure they would love a juicy story like this one to plaster all over there network is there any solution to our delema i wish there was but it seems that vac isnt doing a damm thing to help those of us who are beeing dumped into the edgile end of retrubition of the gaming community. I say yes to standing up for your rights as a consumer of digital layers of fun, this is yet another attempt at our walletts and it will be a sad day in hell when they think they will get more money from me even if im a fan of the valve products vac is not a stable anti cheat system and they know it.

     November 21st, 2007 at 11:26 pm

137. Robert Oakley says:

     1. I would like to state that i have also been banned from vac and they are definitely wrong for doing this I have never hacked or cheated on any game ever. I think it’s a sad day when they try to get more people who play the game already to go out and buy their product again this is obviously a stunt to make more money on vac and steams account i think the best solution is to go public with this problem write g4 I’m sure they would love a juicy story like this one to plaster all over there network is there any solution to our dilemma i wish there was but it seems that vac isn’t doing a damm thing to help those of us who are being dumped into the edgier end of retribution of the gaming community. I say yes to standing up for your rights as a consumer of digital layers of fun, this is yet another attempt at our wallets and it will be a sad day in hell when they think they will get more money from me even if I’m a fan of the valve products vac is not a stable anti cheat system and they know it.

     sorry for resubmiting this i had a few misspelled words and didnt realize it untill i posted it whoops lol you get the point anyways

     November 21st, 2007 at 11:38 pm

138. Madcow9597 says:

     They are banning people they claim cheated but I’ll tell you from experience. I got banned and I never cheated. I wouldn’t know even how to. Steam politely tell you your banned with no proof. I have asked for proof. I scanned my system for viruses and the only thing I did was install a skin Steam claimed was safe. BS. They are just wrongfully banning people to steal their money. If People cheat then prove it. They wont even answer support tickets. Theives is what I say. Oh before people say it I bought this at Best Buy.

     December 1st, 2007 at 8:46 am

139. Mitch Minerd says:

     wow i read all this shit and i have to say im pissed, steam banned my ass 2!!!! the only thing i did was skins and i am pissed!!!!!!! steam needs to get there shit together or there products will suck in the furture!!!!

     January 30th, 2008 at 8:03 pm

140. edna says:

     well it said my son was banned but come to ind out his cd key was hacked now he cant play and i contacted steam and low and behold they say he was banned but he wasnt he was hacked it even said in his steam server he was hacked by some dude named vortex who was making fun of it
     and no im not buying another product

     March 26th, 2008 at 5:25 pm

141. Xalphox says:

     I also got an equal response to you and I haven’t even been VAC’d before.

     I’ve asked before why they don’t provide logs (such as the file that they detected having an exploit) and why, if they think that VAC is foolproof, that they’re so touchy about reviewing it.

     As you, I got a bunch of idiots that’s life dedication is to sucking off Valve.

     April 9th, 2008 at 12:58 pm

142. Xalphox says:

     Correction, I’m now banned for absolutely no reason either.

     April 17th, 2008 at 10:37 am

143. DeCePTioN34 says:

     Me TOO!! i don’t even know what to do since i had like 13 games on my account. Valve - People hated you when you came out and people still hate you!

     April 21st, 2008 at 1:56 pm

144. no matter says:

     Ok. This is really sad. A friend got banned today, was he cheating? Hell, I dunno but after reading all this stupid non-sense I’m thinking about un-installing steam. Even if ppl are hacking they deserve a second chance? This is just sad to no end?? . If ALL of these ppl are hacking then prove it? And if valve is this hardcore on cheaters then why give them the option to *clears throat* rebuy the game?? Holy crap thats the biggest scam I’ve ever seen? Talk about loading up their pockets? There should by ALL NORMAL MEANS be some sort of negotiation or a “if we find reason to believe a cheat has been detected” kind of policy here? This is ridiculous! I agree with the earlier post of demo the incident or, ban from particular servers not ALL vac secured? Thats just means of ripping ppl with their BS rebuy scam which don’t make since anyways??? I haven’t been as unfortunate as most here but I’m not going to sit around and get a load shot onto my face!

     April 25th, 2008 at 9:12 pm

145. José Pereira says:

     I to was banned for no reason, and the only thing that could have happend has alot of reasons why it couldn’t have caused it, this happend sometime before april 25th and may 1st, during these aproxemetly 2 weeks, I had surpased my download traffic limit and could not download/upload anything else or else it would cost alot more than the my usual broadband montly fee and therefore I couldn’t play, and to not download anything accedently I closed my internet connection, on the 25th, my birthday, a friend of mine came over to give me a little “present”, this present was a trojan(which is not a keylogger I checked) that I could use at my own free will, I tried to open it but windows wouldn’t open it, I did open the internet connection for a while because he wanted to show me some videos of him making homemade guns on youtube (he is a little troublesome, I call him the Incarnation of Lucifer but he is a good guy at heart), so on may 1st, when I open my connection I get the warning that I was banned from all VAC secure servers, I started sending replies and made a topic that was locked after I started asking: how could a hacker even possibly hack me when my intenet isn’t even turned on? And all of the replies I got sounded like they are writen by robots, and in my last attempt at trying to reach them with a email that I wouldn’t show to people I know, telling me about how I have no life, I’m young, I only got my own computer 2 months ago and how I absolutly loved Valve’s games and they’re full awnser was and quote: “Hello,

     A staff member has replied to your question:

     Hello,

     I am sorry that we will not able to resolve this issue to your satisfaction.

     Please let us know if you have any further questions - we will be happy to assist you.”

     P.S: Also somebody I know and don’t want to say what connection he has to me, lets just call him my “cousin” once played with me and a friend of mine sometime around 3 months ago using speed hacks and never got caught, so apperently VAC works in reverse.

     May 4th, 2008 at 10:48 am

146. José Pereira says:

     So now what? We need to do something! Can’t we like make a petition or something(a real one)? Dave dude you wrote the damm article got any idea?

     May 7th, 2008 at 1:13 pm

147. Kevin says:

     I too was VAC banned for no reason around October of 2007. After a month of grueling back and forth e-mails with Steam support, there was still no satisfaction to me. It is like you are talking to a robot.

     What had happened was I stopped playing for a week because of midterm exams and I needed to study. So I come back and what do I know - I’m VAC banned from every game using the Source engine.

     Upon talking to Steam all they told me was basically this, “You were VAC banned. The ban is legitimate. We will not tell you how or why this happened. But however you can repurchase the game if you want to play again.” SOUNDS LIKE A SCAM TO ME.

     Just recently the same thing happened to one of my friends. He made the account and after one week, he was VAC banned…and the funny thing is that the account had hardly ever been used. Isn’t VAC a delayed banning system? Doesn’t it take a couple weeks? Yeah a week on a brand new account and he was done…It’s total BS and Valve knows it. They’re scamming people right and left getting them to buy new games. I wish someone could rake up some proof of this.

     There’s only one sentence I want to conclude this with.

     **** Valve and every single person that works for them.

     May 16th, 2008 at 3:13 pm

148. José Pereira says:

     Is it just coincidence, or is every that is banned inactive from their account for some period of time? Is it possible that Valve just uses that inactive period has an excuse to say you were probably hacked during that time? Who will saves us from the cruel dictatorship of Valve? Who will slay they’re evil minions that are complete ***holes and wish they could make love to VAC? And who will destroy VAC and let us finally enjoy our games?

     May 17th, 2008 at 2:34 pm

149. Peter says:

     Yeah.. my friend was playing cs at my house and hes really good so they banned him from a server and then i got my account banned. when i emailed steam, no response

     May 21st, 2008 at 10:47 pm

150. Stoopid says:

     First off, I would like to say that that is one damn good article.

     Ok. I have been recently banned for no apparent reason. Apparently, I was banned from CS:S, but when I checked my Steam Settings, I seemed to have been banned from this list of games.

     Counter-Strike: Source Beta
     Half-Life: Source
     Day of Defeat: Source Beta
     Half-Life 2: Lost Coast
     Half-Life 2: Episode One
     Portal
     Portal: The First Slice
     Half-Life 2: Episode Two
     Team Fortress 2
     Source Dedicated Server
     Half-Life 2: Demo
     Half-Life 2
     Spacewar
     Counter-Strike: Source
     Zombie Master 1.1.3

     Now, I rarely play CS:S or TF2, but I have no idea what half of these games are, and have never downloaded/played/used just about any of them.

     I am utterly confused on how I am banned from these games, and how I was banned in the first place. I would love to see Steam come up and pop out with some “We are sorry” ****, but I have my doubts that will happen.

     Does anyone else have this accusing?

     June 3rd, 2008 at 9:14 pm

151. José Pereira says:

     When you get VAC banned, you get banned from every source game and every game that uses VAC (such has DoD).

     June 4th, 2008 at 12:40 pm

152. José Pereira says:

     Are we gonna make a ****ing uprising or what? Idon’t even want to play any of Valve’s games anymore, I will never forgive this not even if they make a parade in my honor, I just want my God dammed money back!

     June 4th, 2008 at 12:43 pm

153. Dave H says:

     I’m outraged at Valve. I used to play CS a lot and now am just a periodic player (until today). Apparently some time in the past 2 months my account was hijacked and then the hacker used my account to hack in the game.

     Valve support got my account back for me when I submitted the necessary documentation but they refuse to lift the VAC ban.

     WTF?! All they say is “you should have kept better control of your account. Huh? I never shared any account info with ANYONE, EVER. Plus my virus definitions are up to date. There’s NOTHING I could have done to better protect myself.

     I later found out that there are programs out there that allow a hacker to steal your account just by guessing your account name.

     But “tough luck.” Bull. They have the ability to turn off a ban and they should exercise it. The hackers don’t contest this stuff, they just choose the next “destroyer111″ and steal their account. It’s only us legitimate customers who get screwed.

     BTW, I consulted an attorney and he told me that click through EULAs are not enforcable in a court of law. I’ve decided to try through the Better Business Bureau before actually suing. Hopefully that will work.

     Otherwise I’m gonna start a class action lawsuit. It will be a fun supplement to my law school education this fall.

     July 23rd, 2008 at 1:41 pm

154. Spoooky says:

     VALVe has actually banned all these accounts from me these are the digits.

     They have banned 2 - 4 Digits.
     2 - 5 Digits.
     3! - 6 Digits
     3 - 7 Digits
     and 9 - 8 Digits.
     All after updates ive never cheated in my life..
     I actually worked for VALVe and i worked for ESEA and CAL and i still get vac banned this many times? Over updates. I’m tired of steam’s sh!t.

     August 17th, 2008 at 11:21 am

155. Andrew Korman says:

     http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/vacflawed/index.html

     Sign it.

     August 18th, 2008 at 7:26 pm

156. Delith says:

     Well.. just last year i was VAC banned for no reason for cheating and I HAVE no cheats.. maybe skins but thats only it…
     “skins arent not even a cheat”
     just a change to the different types of different weapons or whatever..

     September 24th, 2008 at 8:02 pm

157. rene fernando says:

     minha steam foi banida =/ e eu nun uso xiter =/ jogo quase todo dia no arenaturbo aii quando eu fui jogar apareçeo q eu estava banido sacanagen isso =/

     October 7th, 2008 at 7:58 am

158. Dox says:

     What most of you seem to forget is that:
     A) Just because YOU haven’t hacked on your account, doesn’t mean someone else has.

     B)The people who are hacking will say the EXACT same things you are, if Valve start giving Accounts back to people who say “I wasn’t cheating”. Hackers wont admit to hacking will they now especially if it means that they will get there accounts back.

     You have no proof, other than your word, and your word is so easy to change.

     VAC Works it checks for hacks running in memory and Edited DLL’s. It will only ban for KNOWN cheats\hacks. Some Skin packs etc can change files that will trigger a VAC ban. People also put hacks into some skin packs etc JUST so you will be banned.

     Your Laws suits will all fail, as what evidence do you have?
     a load of people saying “I didn’t do it”? How is that going to work. If i killed someone and in Court said that i didn’t do it. Does that end the trial’? am i allowed to leave and no more is said about it? No.
     Therefore it wont work with yours.

     November 15th, 2008 at 5:28 am

159. ryan says:

     the forum link seems to be broken or has the forum been ended?

     please respond to my questions as the problem that your brother faced is the same problem that I am facing now. I would really like to know more about the faulty VAC banning system.

     compliments…

     April 16th, 2009 at 2:45 pm

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